Is Karl Rove following in the fatal arrogance of his father figure, Richard Nixon?

Like his equally twisted mentor, Rove is an amoral, mean-spirited gutter fighter. Both share the crime of treason.

With a brutally effective blitzkrieg of dirty tricks, racist manipulation, character assassination and public deceit, Karl Rove has spent a lifetime avenging Richard Nixon's lasting shame.

But Watergate was small potatoes. Nixon's truly impeachable crime was his illegal attack on Cambodia, which sent millions to the killing fields. For that he should have been imprisoned forever, forced to face a 24/7 audio-visual wall blaring the screams of his innocent victims.

Nixon's actual treason came in the 1968 election. On Hubert Humphrey's behalf, Lyndon Johnson was on the brink of signing an October peace deal with North and South Vietnam. A cessation of hostilities would have defeated Nixon.

But Nixon's covert minions intervened. In direct violation of American and international law, the Nixon campaign offered the south Vietnamese a "better deal" if they would reject LBJ's peace overtures.

They did, and seven more years of horrendous slaughter followed. By any legal and moral accounting, Nixon's sabotage of peace talks with foreign government was an act of treason.

Nixon was never charged for that high crime. Nor has Rove been indicted for his traitorous role in the American assault on Iraq.

By all accounts, Rove has concocted a horrific string of lies, deceptions and provocations to drag the US into an illegal and catastrophic war. The attractions of oil, war profiteering, personal revenge and Biblical prophecy all had their role to play.

But Rove understood above all that the immensely unpopular George W. Bush stood no chance for a second term unless he could run as a "war President." He needed some armed conflict somewhere. Iraq was the venue of choice. The public rationale was then concocted.

Like Nixon and Vietnam, Rove is undoubtedly legally insulated for most of his high crimes.

But "The Architect" has fallen prey to Nixonian arrogance. In 1972, "Tricky Dick" carried 49 states and thought he could never be touched. Two years later he was disgraced and gone.

In 2004 Rove engineered his second straight stolen election. He sat astride a political machine with unprecedented dominance over the White House, Congress, courts and media.

With no Democratic Congress or gutsy major media to contend with, he seemed even more secure than Nixon in 1972.

But along the way Nixon took time to break into Democratic Headquarters. And Karl Rove saw fit to out a covert CIA agent, whose husband has conjured some powers of his own.

And as with Nixon, there is untold power in the fact that countless millions hate what Karl Rove has done to this nation and the world.

What other arrogant missteps has Rove made?

Could a stroke to Bush's brain send this administration into a "Final Days" of its own?

Let's hope so. Let's work for it. Like father, like son.

Harvey Wasserman is the author of Harvey Wasserman's History of the United States and A Glimpse of the Big Light: Losing Parents, Finding Spirit. He is co-editor of Did George W. Bush Steal America's 2004 Election?

© 2005 Free Press